The ability to monitor an area is necessary in many fields. Retail businesses may wish to monitor their showrooms during or after business hours to identify shoplifting, shortages of goods, or hazardous conditions. Other sites may require monitoring for general security purposes.
Typically, such monitoring is accomplished using video surveillance systems. One drawback to such systems is the large amount of video data collected, which may require a great deal of time to review in order to identify events of interest. Another drawback is the significant expense associated with the system itself, which may include a number of video cameras, and with the storage of the video data collected.
Accordingly, there exists a need in the art to overcome the deficiencies and limitations described hereinabove.